Manitoba is a Canadian prairie province which entered into
Confederation in 1870 after the Red River Rebellion. The area has been
inhabited for thousands of years, with European contact made in the
17th century. The province has over 10,000 lakes, and has a largely
continental climate due to its mostly flat topography. Agriculture,
found especially in the fertile southern and western parts of the
province, is vital to its economy; other major industries are
transportation, manufacturing, mining, forestry, energy, and tourism.
The political and cultural capital, Winnipeg, is home to four of the
province's five universities, all four of its major professional sports
teams, and most of its cultural events. The city is also a
transportation and military hub, hosting a busy international airport
and the regional headquarters of NORAD. The province has a population
of over one million; its largest ethnic group is English, but it has a
significant Franco-Manitoban minority and a growing aboriginal
population. The province's name, meaning "strait of the spirit" or
"lake of the prairies", is derived from the languages of its early
aboriginal inhabitants.
Read the rest of this article:
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manitoba>
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Today's selected anniversaries:
1885:
North-West Rebellion: Louis Riel and the Métis rebels were decisively
defeated by Canadian forces under Major-General Frederick Middleton in
Batoche, Saskatchewan.
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Louis_Riel>
1926:
The Trades Union Congress, a federation of British trade unions,
announced that it would end its week-long general strike "in defence of
[[Coal miners|[coal] miners']] wages and hours".
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1926_United_Kingdom_general_strike>
1941:
German engineer Konrad Zuse presented the Z3 , the world's first
working programmable, fully automatic computer, to an audience of
scientists in Berlin.
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Z3_%28computer%29>
1975:
The Cambodian navy seized the American container ship SS Mayaguez in
recognized international waters, but claimed as territorial waters by
Cambodia.
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mayaguez_incident>
2008:
An earthquake measuring about 8.0 Ms struck the Sichuan province of
China, killing at least 69,000 people, injuring at least 374,000, and
leaving at least 4.8 million others homeless.
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2008_Sichuan_earthquake>
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Wiktionary's word of the day:
couple-close (n):
(heraldry) A diminutive of the chevron, always borne in closely placed
pairs
<http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/couple-close>
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Wikiquote quote of the day:
I think one's feelings waste themselves in words, they ought all to be
distilled into actions and into actions which bring results.
--Florence Nightingale
<http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Florence_Nightingale>
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